Healthy popcorn preparation methods are popping up everywhere these days, but it’s important to be mindful of what you’re adding to your bowl. Despite its nutritional value, there are many ways to prepare the popular snack that can cause it to lose its health benefits and even make it harmful.
Here are five unhealthy ways people sometimes prepare popcorn.
Substituting Coconut Oil for Butter
Coconut oil is rich in saturated fat. This isn’t the best choice due to its high saturated fat content. It also has a higher smoke point than butter, meaning it can be heated at a very high temperature before turning into harmful compounds that are bad for your health.
That doesn’t mean you should toss it out for the stovetop altogether though. Use coconut oil in moderation and stick to low-temperature cooking when cooking salted caramel popcorn.
Using Table Salt Instead of Healthy Unsalted Popcorn Toppings
Table salt puts your health at risk as it is prepared by taking natural salt and putting it through a purification process. As a result, manufacturers add anticaking and preservative chemicals to the salt so it doesn’t clump when exposed to air. Unfortunately, these extra additives aren’t doing anything for your health either.
All this processing removes the naturally occurring minerals that occur in unprocessed natural sea salt. While the American Heart Association recommends limiting sodium consumption to 1,500 milligrams a day for adults and children over the age of 14, most Americans eat about 3,300 milligrams of salt each day.
Cooking In the Microwave
While microwaving popcorn is certainly better than frying it in oil, it’s still not as healthful as other methods because you’re basically nuking all the nutrients in your salted caramel popcorn for example, when you cook it this way. Also, if you choose to add butter or salt after cooking, you’re defeating the purpose.
The Wrong Equipment
Using the right salted caramel popcorn popper is important if you want perfect popcorn each time. That’s because an air popper or maker can help you lower the calorie count by removing excess oils, plus it ensures your popcorn is evenly coated with buttery goodness.
But if you use a different method to pop the corn kernels (i.e. in a pan on the stove), be sure to use healthy ingredients like coconut oil. It’s also a good idea to ditch the dairy for this method since traditional butter contains eight grams of fat per tablespoon.
With Artificial Flavors and Dyes
These flavoring agents are not only unhealthy, but they’re also scientifically engineered for maximum taste (which means that not only will you crave them more, but other foods such as cereal and popsicles will also taste better). If you’re eating popcorn simply for the health benefits, then this is not the way to go.
Instead of using any of these unhealthy methods, why not try popping some kernels on your stove or in an air popper? There’s no need to add butter if you don’t want to (you can always melt it later if you want to add more), and this way you won’t have to worry about chemicals or too much salt.